Unfaithful
by CuteCat213
Summary: Maka can't do it anymore. It's killing him, killing her. Everyday the lies grow, and so does the pain. She has to stop it, she HAS to. Before it kills them both. Cool people don't cheat on their partners, wasn't that what Soul said? SoMa. (Post Manga timeline.)
1. Chapter 1

**Almost a month since my last song-inspired fic? *gasp!* The horror! And my Soul Eater fic dominion expands once again! Mwuahaha!**

 **...This one touches on some rather sensitive subjects, so please let me know how well I've handled them, and if the ending is too one way or the other, well... it is a fanfic...**

 **Song is, of course, 'Unfaithful' by Rihanna.**

* * *

Maka's eye flickered open from her nap, but the weight on her chest pressed her back into the mattress. She didn't want to get up, she didn't want to face the day, face _them_ , face herself. It was just too much anymore, she couldn't handle it.

She forced herself up and started getting ready, surprised, when she came out of the bathroom, that Soul was even there. They stared at each other in silence for a moment. Soul noticed her state, "Uh.. nice hair-do."

Maka self-consciously pinched one of the carefully curled locks, "...Thanks. I'm going out with the girls." she said, an excuse for why she was wearing her hair in a style Soul had never cared for.

Soul's eyes flashed with pain and Maka knew it was a lie she hadn't even had to tell. Soul knew where she was going just as surely as she did. He leaned forward and kissed her cheek, "Cool." Maka felt her eyes slip closed on threat of tears as he walked past to take off his jacket.

She hated this: The tension, the lies, the pain. How had it even started? She loved Soul, loved him more than anything, more than her own life. It was more than just love, they were soulmates, partners- or they had been. Ah, yes, that's right: _that_ was how it all began.

With late-night meetings with the other Death Scythes, with Maka staying up late waiting for Soul to come home, only to fall asleep before he walked in the door and wake up after he'd left the next day. Soul wasn't just any Death Scythe, he was Kid's _main weapon_ , he didn't need her as a Meister anymore. There was no more fighting, no more collecting souls, witch or otherwise. And even as Maka eventually did what she had, she just couldn't bring herself to take on a new Weapon partner. The thought alone made her soul recoil.

So she had begun avoiding home, stayed out later and later, thinking and hurting but unwilling to speak to Kid and Soul- what could really be done? And into that state of turmoil and roiling emotions, Damian had stepped. He'd taken her out, talked with her like an equal, and it felt so, _so_ good, to have someone to talk to about anything again. It was almost like having her Soul back. And then it had gone further, and then too far.

Maka could remember waking up that next morning, tangled in sheets that weren't her own, and hating herself utterly. She had left and avoided him for three days, determined to break off whatever their relationship had mutated into, when he met her with flowers and soothing words- and Soul still wasn't home, out on an extended trip with Kid. Maka knew what she should have done there, she also knew that she'd done the exact opposite.

Soul came home to Maka religiously cleaning everything and washing the sheets for the third time. She said a musk rat had snuck in and musked everything. Soul stopped her from scrubbing the floors, her hands raw from doing so for hours, since she'd seen Damian off. Soul just picked her up and laid with her on the bed- and didn't say a word as she curled into his arms and cried all night long.

The web of lies grew.

 _"Girls make wild assumptions. That's what you said, right? Well tell me, what reason do men have to cheat?_ _ **I wish you would all just die!**_ _"_

But it wasn't just her anymore. Somehow, somewhere along the way, Soul had found out. She didn't know how, didn't know where she'd messed up, but it had almost been a relief- at first. She expected to be called on it, to be shouted at, to be thrown out, told to go back to her father's since apparently they'd get along well now, more alike than she'd ever thought. But nothing changed, nothing except them. Soul watched every time she went out, his eyes full of pain matched by the suffocating weight in her chest, a fake smile on his face to match the one she showed the world.

And every day, it only got worse. The nights she stayed in when Soul was there, when they slept in the same bed, he held her close, held her tight, and sometimes, he shook. And those nights, when Maka snuggled into his hold, she knew that Soul was her whole world, and that she would do anything for him. She cried about what she _had done_ to him, and Soul only held her tighter, his soul resonating with fear of losing her. They would go to sleep clinging to each other.

But every morning, he would be gone again, and Maka would be alone... and Damian would call, asking to go out, to talk and have fun and leave her troubles behind her, and Maka had so _many_ troubles to leave...

And the pain grew.

The smile on Soul's face as she stepped out the door and closed it behind her cracked her mask and she stood on the doorstep, watching the whitewashed wood. Every time she stepped out the door, she could see it in his eyes, feel it in his soul, killing him. But he still smiled at her, still kissed her good-bye, still let her go, still left. Maka's grip on the clutch in her hands tightened, strangling it as she turned around and began walking.

Because her cheating wasn't just killing Soul. ...It was killing her, too.

She didn't want to hurt him anymore. Hurting Soul at all was the last thing she wanted. But her legs still moved as though she couldn't stop them, couldn't stop herself. Maka hated herself. How could she smile and laugh with Damian when she knew Soul was alone and breaking under the pressure of her actions back home? How could she let him lead her off, hold her, touch her, when she still lay in Soul's arms at night -some nights...- and how could she stand it at all when it was Soul she wanted?

Damian was fun, he listened, he was sweet, but he wasn't Soul. He didn't make her heart stop in her chest, he didn't make her feel like she could fly, he didn't make her spirit soar. But he did make her happy, for just a little while. And he was there when Soul wasn't. It was just that that had stopped being enough at some point, possibly the moment it had gone too far, or the moment Soul had found out. And every trip, every touch, every gift, only made it worse.

Maka's steps dragged, weighed down by the crushing force behind her ribcage. It made every breath an effort, every heartbeat a battle won to continue on. She shook her head, tears trailing down her cheeks. _I don't want to do this anymore_. She thought it every time, and every time it happened again. Her nails dug into her clutch as she thought of the lost look on Soul's face. _Like father, like daughter._ Maka didn't forgive her father any more for what he'd done when she was little; on the contrary, she just hated herself as much as she'd hated him for doing it. She was -she _had been_ \- a Meister, she should have better self-control. She should be able to _stop_ , if Soul could control himself around Blair's endless propositions, Maka should be able to break this off. She should-

...She should be home, now, with Soul, not out walking the streets on the way to her lover's place. Her steps faltered. _Who am I?_ She looked down at what she was wearing. A _dress_. Soul always laughed at her when she put on fancy clothes, said she just looked better in something casual. She lifted a hand and pinched that same lock of curled hair as earlier. Soul hated it when she curled her hair, or did anything with it, really. He preferred it natural and loose, so he could run his fingers through it.

Damian preferred her hair curled, or up, in intricate fashions. Like her hair was just another accessory. And he preferred the bright dresses, too, like she was a pretty present for him to unwrap. Maka looked at herself in a window she passed and didn't recognize the person staring back at her, holding a clutch in her hands. She didn't know who this person was, but it certainly didn't feel like _her_. It was a costume she'd put on. This wasn't something she'd wear at home while curled up on the couch with a good book- that Soul would pluck from her hands, silencing any protest with a kiss, and then drag her out on the town in spite of her complaints and without giving her time to change into anything else, because Soul didn't _want_ her to change. He wanted her exactly as she was always.

Maka's hand fell and she turned away from the window, her pace picking up. Wanting didn't get a person anywhere, it took actions. She knew that. It took- it took _courage_.

Maka stood before the door and breathed in deeply, then raised her hand to knock. Damian opened the door with a charming smile and perfectly white teeth, grabbing her hand and pulling her in for a kiss that Maka kept close-mouthed. Maka's brain fizzled as Damian took her wrap, all of his attention focused solely on her, and her determination wavered in the face of that gleaming look.

He took her by the hand and led her upstairs, and Maka could feel herself becoming stuck in the rut. Damian's charisma catching her again. And nothing would change. She'd give in, let him hold her, touch her, _have her_. Wake up later hating herself more and guiltily gather her clothes, slipping from the house out into the night for the walk back home. Every step would hurt like walking on thorns, and she'd open the door back home, stepping into a night and day of loneliness-

No, Soul was home tonight. So she'd probably come home to him sleeping at the kitchen table, having fallen asleep while waiting for her to come home. And she'd touch his shoulder to wake him up, and those scarlet eyes would open in sleepy confusion. They'd catch sight of her and light up in that combination of pain and relief and love, glad, grateful, that she was back, that she was safe, that she was still his- as far as she was.

 _No!_

Maka's feet froze on the third step from the top, her chest too tight to breathe. She couldn't. She could _not_ do this anymore! Because her heart was _breaking._ Breaking in her chest with every beat and her soul screamed out in agony at the look in Soul's eyes everytime she came back. This temporary happiness wasn't worth the pain, worth the _hurt_ that it caused. Maka was _done_. Every morning it was harder to get up, and she just wanted to sleep forever to get away from it all. She would rather _die_ than face the pain anymore. That's what she'd been thinking: that suicide was better than trying to end things with her illicit lover or talk to Soul and Kid.

What was _wrong_ with her? Where was the courage she was famous for? Afraid she'd hurt Kid or Soul for asking them? Like what she was doing now wasn't _killing_ him, killing her?

Damian stopped, looking back at her in confusion, "Maka?"

"I-I..." _Say it!_ "I..." _Stop the pain, the torture, stop it now. Just say it!_ "I..." _You might as well put a gun to his head and pull the trigger yourself if you can't._ The whole world stopped, two heartbeats echoing inside Maka's head, the image of Soul as she'd last seen him behind her eyelids, smiling for her, plastic to hide the hurt he felt, but letting her go anyway. _Say it._ "I can't do this anymore."

"...What?"

"I can't do this anymore. I'm done. This, us, it's over. I can't. _I can't_."

"Maka, you don't mean that. Come talk to me over some drinks."

"I've never meant anything more in my whole life." She brutally crushed the temptation to step out on the slippery slope of that invitation. She had to end it all, cut at the root of the issue. "We're over, Damian. I don't want to see you again, I don't want to talk to you again." Before she could rethink it or stop herself, Maka pulled out her phone and erased his number.

"Maka, _stop it_! What did I do?"

"...You kissed me. I know what I want of my life, and this isn't it. I'm done being two people, I'm done hurting my friends and loved ones with secrets. I'm _done._ " She pulled herself away from him and quickly trotted down the stairs.

Damian's voice stopped her at the doorway, "And if I tell him?"

Maka froze with one foot out the door, her fingers tightening on the doorframe. Her chest throbbed, but it felt lighter, and she couldn't help the smile on her face as she looked back at him. A smile more true and unwaveringly happy than she had ever managed for him, "Soul already knows about you, about us, Damian, and he let me come here anyway. Can you ever love someone that much? Can you even _imagine_ loving someone so truly? He knew, and he let me have you anyway, but you... you threatened to try and take him away from me. Good bye."

Maka closed the door behind her definitively, stepping out into the night. The sky was dark with more than the evening and it started to sprinkle. It began to rain in earnest as she walked, but it didn't bother her. Maka's steps were light, her _heart_ was lighter than it had been in a long time. It hurt, and the thought of an uncertain future loomed, but she pushed it away, turning her face up to the cleansing rain. Then she realized that _Soul was home_. She laughed and took off running.

She panted before the door of their home ten minutes later, her hair a mess from the rain, plastered to her head, her dress ruined from running through the mud, she hadn't even picked up her wrap on the way out of Damian's. And Maka didn't care about any of it.

She paused for only a moment before reaching out and turning the handle, stepping through. Soul looked and stilled in place at seeing her standing there, dripping wet and panting, from where he was setting up a dinner for two. His eyes widened, "You're back."

And Maka finally remembered _why_ it was that Soul had gotten home early: It was their anniversary. And even after she'd left him, Soul was still setting up an anniversary dinner to surprise her. Maka couldn't help it, she reached up and wiped at her eyes as she nodded, the tears not the least deterred as they ran down her face, following the trails raindrops had already made. "I'm back."

Soul stepped around the table towards her and Maka threw herself at him, clinging like a lamprey. Soul's arms closed around her and he just held her as she buried her face in his chest and let the tears come. They were even more cleansing than the rain had been. They weren't the heart-wrenching kind she'd given into before, these ones were happy, they were relief, they were love. Because Maka's chest felt too tight for entirely different reasons.

When they finally trailed off, she pulled back and stood up on tip-toe, kissing Soul. He startled in surprise, because they hadn't really kissed in a long time. Too long a time. "Soul-"

"Tomorrow. Come on, Maka, I made dinner."

She wiped her face off, "Kay. One minute. Let me go change out of this ridiculous outfit."

Maka undressed and dried off in the bathroom. She tossed the clothes, she didn't want to wash them, she didn't want to put them up to dry. She never wanted to see them again. She was going to clean out the entire house, every knick-knack that Damian had gotten her, anything that even _reminded_ her of him, she was going to pitch it. ...Tomorrow. She had more important things to worry about tonight.

Maka didn't bother putting her hair up in even a ponytail, letting it loose. She came out dressed in gray sweatpants -that may or may not have been Soul's- and a butter-yellow hoodie. Soul looked at her like he'd never seen her before. She pulled the hoodie's hem lower and looked away, cheeks heating, "What? I'm cold."

"You look amazing."

The flush on her cheeks overtook her whole face and she peeked up at him to see if he was lying, but the heat in Soul's eyes said very clearly that he meant every word he said. Maka looked away again and shuffled over to the table. Before she could pull out a chair to sit, Soul grabbed her and hauled her into his lap, making her shout, "Soul! I'm heavy!"

He scoffed, "You hardly weigh a thing soaking wet."

She looked away with a smile, a small hurting place inside of her healing from a careless comment tossed her way by Damian one night when they'd been out eating.

Maka squealed at Soul's hold on her, wiggling in place, "Soul, stop that! I'm ti-ticklish! You know that!"

He grinned at her, "Yeah, I do."

She puffed out her cheeks and pouted at him. Then she spotted the food on the table, running her finger through the gravy and dabbing Soul on the nose with it. She giggled as he went cross-eyed trying to see the spot. He made a sound of disgust that she didn't believe for a second and reached for a napkin with the hand he wasn't holding her with to wipe it off.

Maka settled back against him and they ate in quiet that, for the first time in what seemed like forever, wasn't tense or uneasy. It was intimate and warm and just... them. When the -delicious- meal was almost gone, Maka spotted another stray drop of gravy on Soul's cheek, and without thinking, leaned over and licked it off. When she leaned back, Soul was watching her with surprise- and with heat, "Maka..."

She moved forward until their foreheads touched, watching him watching her unflinchingly, and whispered, "Tomorrow." Before sealing their lips again.

Soul picked her up without ever breaking the kiss, carrying her toward the bed, and Maka held on. They broke apart and Maka let out a huff of breath as she landed on the mattress with Soul over her, "Maka..."

She pulled him close, as close as she could, "My Soul..."

Soul trembled in her arms, his lips a whisper of movement against her throat, "My Maka."

"Yours. No one else's. Just yours."


	2. Epilogue

Maka woke up to the morning sun creeping heat across her body, petrified to move in case all of last night had been a wonderful dream that would shatter like stained glass if she so much as breathed.

She clutched tightly to whatever leftover or imagined courage she had left, and turned her head. Her breath left her in a rush. Soul was there. He was _there_. He wasn't gone, the only evidence he'd been there at all a mussed blanket in his general shape. He was asleep, his arm around her, using her bare stomach as his own personal pillow.

Maka ran her fingers through his spiky hair, frustrated at the tears that pricked her eyes. She was so tired of crying lately. But she was so, _so_... _happy_ that Soul was really here, that she wasn't alone anymore. He murmured in his sleep and snuggled closer to her warmth.

As much as she wanted to spend the rest of the day in Soul's arms, she had things she needed to do. Maka carefully extricated herself from his hold and went to the kitchen. She grabbed a garbage bag and then went to her closet, opening it and tearing things from the hangers. Everything. She couldn't stand the sight of any of it. She'd go shopping for a whole new wardrobe, consisting of tees and sweats. She nodded. Okay, so maybe a few more things, like a sweater and some cute button-ups. But she was done with dresses and fancy anythings.

Next was the chest of drawers: nearly everything went into the bag- and then a second when she ran out of room in the first. Next was a seemingly random assortment of decorations and knick-knacks. She wasn't going to risk anything dragging her back down the path she'd clawed and fought for freedom from. Not one single item of sentimentality was going to stop her from taking back her life with her own hands.

By the time Maka was done, four bags of trash waited to be taken out, and she was going to do it that moment. She put on a pair of tennis shoes and grabbed the first two bags. Tomorrow was garbage day, they'd be gone forever then.

Another trip followed with the last two and Maka stood in the middle of the room looking around, making sure she'd gotten everything. With a satisfied nod, she grabbed up her phone- and saw that it had some three-hundred texts and forty calls from an 'unknown' number. Before she could think to check them, Maka went to the bathroom and dropped the small device in the toilet, flushing it. Then she went to the landline to make a call to a certain god of death she knew.

The line rang four times before she was transferred to a secretary- since she no longer had Kid's personal number as she'd just flushed it away. It took almost ten minutes to finally get connected to the man himself, "Maka?"

"Kid. I-I need to talk to you."

"You know you can tell me about anything."

"I want my Weapon back. I can't do this anymore, Kid. This... civilian thing. I can't handle it, seeing him everyday but being unable to wield him. And the thought of pairing with anyone else is unthinkable. I need to be a Meister, it's who I am. And I need to be _Soul_ 's, because that's also who I am. I can't be anything, any _one_ else. It's killing me. It's killing us both." There was a long stretch of silence on the other side of the line that made her fidget. "Kid?"

"I see... Soul has expressed very similar thoughts."

"He... he has?"

Maka almost screamed as arms circled her waist, Soul pressing a kiss against her neck, "He has."

"Very well, I'll get the paperwork taken care of by the end of the day."

"R-really? But, what about you?"

She could almost feel Kid's smile on the other end of the line, "I'm not stuck in the school like my father was -thus the need for phones- and I've been feeling rather... claustrophobic myself lately. I always said I was going to make my own Death Scythes, and Liz and Patty have expressed discontent with their own new Meister. I think it's about time I fixed everything."

Maka absolutely refused to cry again, fingers tightening around the handset, "Thank you, Kid."

"Always. Now, get to know your new Weapon; that's an order."

Maka couldn't stop the giggle from slipping out, "Yes, sir." She hung up and set the phone on the counter, leaning back into Soul's hold. She wanted to stay there forever, but she knew she couldn't. "Soul-"

He held her tighter, "Mine?"

Her heart clenched, and she lifted her hand, weaving her fingers in with his, "Yours, forever yours, Soul. Only yours. I promise. It's all I could handle." She closed her eyes, letting her soul wavelength out to ring against his for the first time in so long. It was a relief, a welcoming, it was coming home. It was Soul.

She didn't mind the tear that slipped past her hold as she felt him resonate within her soul. They still meshed perfectly. There were ragged edges where jagged pieces had broken off, but they matched each other's hurts perfectly. This was all she needed, this was the half of her that she'd been missing and searching so desperately to fill.

Maka turned in Soul's arms and pressed as close as she possibly could. "I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you." She would never get tired of saying those words. "I missed you so much, Soul." her voice cracked, " _Please_ don't leave me again."

"Never, Maka. Together, I promise."

"Forever."

"Forever."

That was enough for her. And the pain faded, washed away by love.


	3. Epilogue-Epilogue

Maka anxiously held the phone to her ear as it rang. She wasn't sure if she should do this, if it would take her back down a well-worn path of pain and anger. But she _had_ to. She had to do this.

The other end stopped ringing as it was picked up, "Maka?"

She could hang up right now, before speaking, she could pretend she'd called by accident, she could-

She couldn't. It would be uncomfortable, but Maka's heart cried out for this resolution. But it didn't stop her voice from trembling, "P-Papa..."

"Is... is there something wrong? Can I help with anything?"

She gripped the phone with both hands, not acknowledging the new flood of tears, "Not really, I called to- I called so _I_ could help something. Papa..."

"What is it, baby?"

"I forgive you."

She stayed on the line even as she heard the phone on the other end of the call drop to the floor. Spirit's voice shook like a leaf in the wind as he scrambled after the phone and picked it back up, "M-Maka? You d-don't mean-"

"I do, Papa. I forgive you. I love you."

She didn't have to see him to know that her father was crying as much as her, "I love you, too, baby girl. Do you... would you like to talk?"

"I- Yes... I'd like that. I've missed you, Papa."

"I've missed you, too, angel. How... how have things been?"

"M-maybe we should sit down. This is going to take a while..."

"I have all the time in the world for you, Maka."

"Well, it all began months ago..."


End file.
